No to bitcoin - says and refuses the Central Bank
Central Bank against mining and cryptocurrencies
The proposal of the Russian Central Bank to impose a ban on mining and trading in digital assets was reported by no means from the Central Bank of the Russian Federation, but from the Bloomberg agency. They have only recently begun to demonstrate disloyalty to the domestic financial authorities, which until now were considered something like an island of democracy.
We have known for a long time that this is the democracy of the dollar, evidence of which is at least the storage of our own reserves in dollar assets.
But why did you need to hit bitcoin right now - another surrogate for the dollar?
Is it really not enough that he was kicked out of China, preparing the soil he fertilized for the digital yuan?
The ruble with the yuan, not like with the dollar, will not be able to compete in this area with all the desire.
Or are we really being prepared for the disconnection from SWIFT and the Iron Curtain?
As you know, the general public in Russia has become involved in digital technologies, as they say, in fact. An almost universal card system, communication with single settlement centers with or without it, even an appointment with a library or a doctor in a remote province, and now also covid QR codes.
What else is needed?
However, the majority of the population is still as far away from stock exchange games and even more so from digital money as the Moon is not to astronauts. Astronauts, however, too.
Bitcoin, admittedly, is still exotic in Russia. Yes, and all cryptocurrencies, too, although almost 10 percent of their turnover falls on Russia.
Today, the Russian share of mining is approximately the same - the generation of cryptocurrencies in networks, and practically only due to the consumption of electricity. It seems that it was the rapidly growing consumption of electricity, in addition to fears of competition for the digital ruble, that forced the Central Bank to say that the crypt should be banned.
And it doesn’t matter anymore that bitcoin, as well as other cryptocurrencies, is one of the key tools for blockchain technologies, that is, an inclusive and transparent network, much cooler than the Internet. Without blockchain, the prospects for the development of 5G networks are doubtful, and there is little chance of remaining among the leaders in the nuclear field, space, and the most advanced military technologies.
In Russia, investments in bitcoin, although they are inferior in scale to bank deposits, are simply very large - the order of numbers is already comparable.
Either in the Ministry of Finance, or in the same Central Bank, they calculated that the Russians have already managed to invest about 7 trillion rubles in cryptocurrencies.
What to fight for?
At the same time, the average revenue is not as solid as it seems to many - about one and a half billion dollars a year. That is, a little more than a percentage per annum - what to fight for is not entirely clear, according to Russian departments. And the ban itself is unlikely to reduce revenue - everything will rest on technical difficulties and the selection of intermediaries.
Obviously, no one in the Central Bank thought that only the taboo on mining could really work, but then who will have to pay for the elimination of generation capacities, which are by no means small. It is only a home farm that can be quickly taken over the hill, but what will happen to entire industries is a question.
In principle, we can agree with those experts who see in the potential decision of the regulator the protection of bankers who are already involved in crypto projects. Maybe they are the ones who will pay. And, probably, just in our country, no one is going to repeat the Chinese experience, giving the opportunity to bitcoin players to “leave their own”. As in preference.
After Bloomberg revealed a terrible secret, a very interesting explanation came from the Bank of Russia: we, you see, are planning a “decrease in threats” due to the fact that the ruble is not a reserve currency. It is not entirely clear then how this is consistent with the readiness of the Central Bank to track the operations of Russians on foreign crypto exchanges.
Not only is it “not your business,” there is no reason to say that the scale and further spread of cryptocurrencies in Russia carries significant risks for the economy and financial stability of the country.
What, bitcoin is pushing the ruble?
If it is crowding, then on the Internet, where the ruble is not visible.
Here comes digital, maybe someone will notice, although there are doubts about this. The ban in Russia, unlike the Chinese “bloc”, is a sign of weakness, not strength.
The digital yuan will easily displace the same bitcoin from where they are used to trading in yuan, dollars and euros. Simply because it is more convenient, and there are no problems with conversion.
And bitcoin, as you know, has just a sea of them, and is it worth it to remind you of the complete unpredictability of its course.
Control shot
It is clear that what confuses various kinds of regulators in cryptocurrencies is their freedom.
We wrote that bitcoin is a surrogate for the dollar, but a surrogate that is almost beyond the control of that Federal Reserve System, although, unlike the dollar, even the scale of emission is specially specified for it.
Not so long ago, it was only about 21 million, now it is believed that much more will have to be mined, that is, generated, although there is a terrible inconsistency in numbers. And all because there is no one person who could answer for bitcoin at all.
In addition to the fact that bitcoin is a surrogate and exclusively digital currency, it also looks too much like a pyramid scheme. And this is with clearly defined emission sizes. But if the issue is fixed, then only the exchange can dictate the rate to bitcoin. She dictates - a growth of thousands of times from the moment of birth.
Almost everything that is done with the crypt is done on the semi-legal market, and bitcoin and its analogues easily “enter” both the drug trade and the financing of terrorism. And this actually justifies the creation of official digital money.
The yuan will definitely pull in numbers, but will the ruble pull?
Obviously, precisely because the market understands this very well, the reaction of stockbrokers to "rumors from Russia" turned out to be so restrained.
But when China came out against bitcoin, everything was different - very seriously. And the rate fell, and sales went rampant. But bitcoin held out, and the Chinese miners fled.
Summing up, we cannot fail to note the environmental passage from the Central Bank, where they confidently stated that mining “creates unproductive consumption of electricity, jeopardizing the energy supply of residential buildings, social infrastructure buildings and enterprises, as well as the implementation of the environmental agenda of the Russian Federation.”
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